What are your 12mo's favourite dinners? Need ideas please!

[mummyxtwo]

Thanks for reading! After having ds1 (4.10yo) with severe feeding difficulties as a baby and a resultant food phobia, I am hugely relieved that dd2 is a reasonably good eater. Ds1 didn't even start solids till he was 15mo, and has only eaten dry things like chicken nuggets, so cooking for a baby is new to me. Dd2 has had lots of lovingly home-cooked meals lavished upon her, partly so I could just tell myself that I'd done everything I could to encourage her to like food this time round.

She eats quite well but doesn't like chicken, or food with solid lumps in - a little 'lumpy' is okay. Her favourite dinners are bolognese with little pasta shells, tomato pasta sauce, shepherd's pie (also a version with Moroccan spices in, and tomatoey), and lentils (cooked with onion and coconut milk, or root veg). She also loves grated cheese.

Due to ds1's eating issues and dh working long hours, I frequently end up cooking 3 different suppers and the afternoon / evening can vanish. So I only have time to make dd2 something new maybe twice a week - I have enough frozen cubes of various meals in the freezer for the other days. I was just wondering what other people's 12mo babies like best for dinner, as I need some new ideas! Thanks in advance.

Mine eats curry.. Just the sauce with some rice.
Fish pie

3 meals a day!! My son eAts our evening meal from the night before. So I cook one meal after he's in bed. Obv you may still need to cook for your older child
K

Cauliflower cheese
Scrambled egg and toast
Salmon with pesto plus some sort of veg and starch (eg salmon plus broccoli plus mashed potato plus pesto)

Cauliflower cheese here to
And mushroom omelette (with cheese)
Also any type of finger food with humous
Blw cookbook cheese and spinach muffins

He's been fussy with his food today (14 mo) worried he is going to start rejecting food

steak pie and mash
shepherds pie
lasagne (veg or mince)
turkey enchiladas
chicken tikka and rice
chicken and chorizo stew
fish fingers and potato wedges
homemade soup

meatballs

When you say she doesn't like solid bits, does that mean that you blend any lumpy stuff? At 12 months the child I used to look after pretty much ate whatever we did, although that did mean making family meals with no added salt. As far as I was aware it is important that they eat properly solid food at this age rather than purées.

She liked everything mince-based, meatballs especially but we tried to stretch her with things like kofte. Risottos were popular, and she was also crazy about roasted veg and so I'd make wedges of things like potato, sweet potato or parsnip with a bit of olive oil and a seasoning like rosemary or sumac.

Hmm yes, I'm still blending most things although not to smooth, I'm leaving it lumpy. She tends to reject things that aren't blended a little. I'll start trying to reduce that and serve her food more like we have it. tricky when I want her to eat and not refuse it! But I'll just have to do that. Thanks for the ideas above, I'll try some of those for sure.

I think your issues with DC1 are colouring your view of feeding your DD. Try offering toast, or other finger foods. Steamed veg - carrots, sweet corn, peas are always favourites. Ripe fruit - bananas, strawberries, grapes etc. all fab. My DD is 11 months and eats what we eat. Spoon refused at 9 months and has been eating "normal" food since then. Loves anything spicy, sausages, dairylea and ham sandwiches.

Gagging and choking is going to happen. It needs to happen for her to understand solids and how to eat properly. BUT there is a huge difference between gagging and all out choking. You WILL know the difference. If my DD gags I just let her get on with it, keeping a beady eye on her an she always sorts herself out. It will take a while for your DD to get finger foods, a lot of the first weeks will be experimentation. I would say it took my DD 3/4 weeks to get to the point were she was actually eating enough to sustain her! Before that, most things got chewed up an spat out!

I'm no expert, and just have my own experience to go on (an my mums experience with us), but it definitely has been a positive one, so hopefully it will help you!

At 12 months, my DS1's favourite meals were (i'm a vegetarian hence the absence of meat stuffs!)

risotto (esp mushroom risotto - although he's not keen on pieces of mushroom he loves mushsroom flavour),

red lentil dahl with nan bread pockets to make into sandwiches,

green lentil shepherd pie with cheesy mash

Stir fried tofu with veg (particularly green beans and baby sweet corn)

polenta with tomato sauce (he loves pasta now, but didn't eat it at all at 12 months so didn't discover his favourite meal of macaroni cheese until he was about 18 months!)

chickpea and okra curry (not spicy) with nan bread pockets

cheese and onion quiche with savoury rice and sweetcorn

Thanks! Good suggestions. rachy she does eat finger foods - fresh fruit, toast, toasted tea cakes, bread sticks, strips of omelette etc - but she doesn't seem to like the textures of cooked veg, it more with things that I spoon feed her like bolgnese and lentils that she prefers blended. I'll just have to bite the bullet and stop blending. It's true that this is all a bit new to me due to ds1's feeding problems, perhaps I should have been more on the ball and stopped blending a while ago.

Don't be too harsh on yourself mummyxtwo, I still blend tomato pasta sauces for DS1 as he doesn't like finding bits of onion in them, he'll eat veggie lasagne now with bits, but if he finds a rogue bit of onion (that might be bigger/tougher than the rest) it can put him off.

He's 4 now, but overall I think he eats enough different stuff, so I'm not too fussed.

Has your daughter had the chance to feed herself the bolognese at all? Might be worth trying her with a spoon as you might find the novelty of it might make her try it more? (of course you may have tried this already and discounted it)

We did BLW with DS1 so a different approach, but even at 6/7 months he could get parts of a spoon of food into his mouth (via his cheek, chin etc) so I'm sure at 12 months your daughter would be able to give it a go (if she hasn't already).

Try not to get too hung up on the 'they should be doing this by 12 months' thing, DD was never textbook about eating really. At 12 months DD was only just getting into the idea of spag bol where I hadn't ground up the mince etc. She would just stick her tongue out with the offending lumps on the end of it and refuse to swallow them.

It moved quite quickly from there though, by 15 months we were on holiday and basically she ate with us in restaurants and we picked something off the menu and she basically got on with it.

I think it can be quite intimidating to have lots of people who have BLW and say things like 'I just gave my 7mo chunks of steak' and you can feel a bit yikes about for whatever reason having been in a position where you have had to do things quite differently. But like most other things child related, they all do things and learn things at different times and in their own way.

DD now eats anything and everything. There is more than one way to introduce children to food and it sounds like you are making progress.

In answer to the actual question, at around one, DD liked her versions of spag bol, fish pie, shepherd's pie, chicken roast dinner (very ground up), risotto-type dishes, macaroni cheese, veg lasagne, beans, scrambled egg, fish fingers, sausages, etc.

Dx

Thank you ladies! Very helpful. x